The final judgments are in and The Tournament of Books winner has been crowned. It was a close match, 11-6, and my vote ended up going to the winner. Go check it out. (And read both of these books, they’re great.)
And the Winner Is…
Paul Beatty Wins the 2016 Man Booker Prize
Novelist Paul Beatty has won this year’s Man Booker Prize for The Sellout, becoming the first American writer to win the Prize. Our own Matt Seidel reviewed the book earlier this year, calling Beatty’s voice “appealing, erudite, and entertaining”; you can trace those voice’s antecedents in this great piece by Alcy Leyva.
Revisit this year’s Booker Shortlist.
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Hilary Mantel Takes Home Her Second Booker Prize
Bring Up the Bodies author Hilary Mantel, Ladbrokes's 6/4 favorite for this year's award, has won her second Man Booker Prize in three years.
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Booker Season
We are swiftly approaching the announcement of the Booker Prize. Britain’s highest award for fiction, the award is fussed over endlessly by the gossip-hungry British press, and, for the winner, the rewards are plentiful, often turning a book into a bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic and beyond. Take Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, for example. This year’s Longlist has been out for a while and the Shortlist will be out in a week. The winner will be crowned on October 19th. For the American reader, it is worth mentioning that this is the first year that American authors are eligible for the Booker. Still, as is often the case, the Longlist includes books that are not currently available in the States, though others have been bestsellers and award winners here. Here are the ones that have excerpts available:The Island Walkers by John Bemrose — excerptHavoc, in Its Third Year by Ronan Bennett — excerptA Blade of Grass by Lewis Desoto — excerptThe Honeymoon by Justin Haythe — excerptThe Great Fire by Shirley Hazzard — excerpt, my reviewCloud Atlas by David Mitchell — excerptThe Master by Colm Toibin — excerptThe Brits love to bet, and the bookmakers over there actually come up with odds and take bets on the Booker each year. According to them Cloud Atlas is the big favourite. And if you don’t believe me when I tell you that the Brits (and the whole of the Commonwealth) get really saucy over the Booker, check out The Bluffer’s Guide to the Booker or better yet, Tibor Fischer’s tell-all about being a Booker Judge.